1. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center The Geographic Information System Tool (GIST): A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Alison M. Eyth, Prashant Pai MCNC Environmental Modeling Center October 22, 2002

2. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center PAVE Limitations l Graphics are written in X-windows / Motif (not good for PCs) l Must be compiled separately for each platform l Only a few maps provided (states, counties, roads, rivers), with limited rendering styles l Cannot plot data in polygons – only rectangular grid cells and limited facilities for observations l Plots accessible over web only as static images

3. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Current GIST Features l Create maps of points, lines, polygons – data from Shapefiles or ASCII format l Data sets drawn in layers, – can be moved up, down, sent to top or bottom, hidden/shown l Configurable data object styles – colors, line thickness, point symbols l Set map projection / ellipsoid l Probe data attributes l Thematic mapping l Querying l Display mouse coordinates, zoom, overview, print

4. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Potential New Data Types l Emission inventories and surrogates l Air quality and meteorological observations l Slices of regular grid air quality model results l Variable grid model results l Multimedia model results (already have prototype) l Water quality model results l Flight paths l Can already support points, lines, polygons from any type of shapefile (e.g. population data, land use)

5. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Behind the Scenes of GIST l Java program – Portable across platforms – Object-oriented / extensible – Runs as desktop application or over web as applet l Uses JLooxGIS class library (www.loox.com) – Basic plotting of points, lines, polygons on map – Coordinate transformations – Zooming – Printing – Panning / map overview – Layer control – Not open-source

6. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Layer Library l Maintains layers loaded between GIST sessions l “Friendly names” can be specified for data sets l Separates file format from objects in display

7. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Probing to show Data Attributes

8. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Thematic map and Layer Options

9. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Query Results as Map and Table

10. ___________________________________________GIST: A New Tool for Visualizing Geographic Data Environmental Modeling Center__________________________________________________ MCNC Environmental Modeling Center Future Directions l Enhancements dependent on funding source – Currently MCNC funded proprietary software l Animation (within data set and across data sets) l Scripting language l Formula language (like PAVE) l Save images to graphics formats l Show satellite pictures and DTED l Save images and data to files l Improved probing, overview, queries, resizing l Save configuration and restart using it l Data subsetting / improved memory management